I bean, Ubeam, we all beam...
November 9, 2015 5:45 PM Subscribe
UBeam claims to be able to do wireless charging via ultrasound. "UBeam, a high-profile start-up backed by some of Silicon Valley's most prominent investors, has become a tech industry sensation because of the wireless charging technology it says it has developed... But the company, which has never demonstrated a fully-functioning prototype, is now facing an onslaught of questions about whether it can actually deliver the breakthrough it is promising." EEVblog is critical. The demo.
It's a boy Mrs. Smith, and he is fully charged.
posted by Oyéah at 6:01 PM on November 9, 2015 [7 favorites]
posted by Oyéah at 6:01 PM on November 9, 2015 [7 favorites]
In a TED speech from 2012, Perry seems to brag that she knew nearly nothing of physics before starting the company—not even how a TV remote control worked. She said the basic idea for uBeam came after only a few hours of Googling, yet portrays herself as the first person to have thought of using ultrasound for wireless power. “It seemed like an awesome idea,” said Perry. “Why hadn't the ultrasound experts thought of it before?”
So it turns out it's not just Republican primary voters who are into this whole "experts don't know anything" schtick.
posted by one_bean at 6:04 PM on November 9, 2015 [47 favorites]
So it turns out it's not just Republican primary voters who are into this whole "experts don't know anything" schtick.
posted by one_bean at 6:04 PM on November 9, 2015 [47 favorites]
It's pretty difficult to believe that wall-voltage -> oscillating coil -> soundwaves -> receiver -> *patented magic* -> device-charge will be anywhere near as economical, much less effective, as say induction's wall-voltage -> coil -> coil -> device-charge approach (not to mention the old standby, wall -> copper wire -> device).
But hey, maybe I'm just a naif here and the emperor is literally wearing sound.
posted by mhoye at 6:15 PM on November 9, 2015 [20 favorites]
But hey, maybe I'm just a naif here and the emperor is literally wearing sound.
posted by mhoye at 6:15 PM on November 9, 2015 [20 favorites]
Yeah, there's also that "every time I charge my phone my cat pees and then faints" problem.
posted by mhoye at 6:22 PM on November 9, 2015 [29 favorites]
posted by mhoye at 6:22 PM on November 9, 2015 [29 favorites]
Hackaday pretty much took this apart a couple of weeks ago. Long story short it's modern snake oil.
posted by Bringer Tom at 6:27 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Bringer Tom at 6:27 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
Long story short it's modern snake oil.
Yes, thank you, that's what the post is about
posted by clockzero at 6:32 PM on November 9, 2015 [14 favorites]
Yes, thank you, that's what the post is about
posted by clockzero at 6:32 PM on November 9, 2015 [14 favorites]
Other effects at 155 dB: "Human keratinocytes become damaged in a way that’s incompatible with life in a matter of minutes due to mechanical stress. You should care about this because keratinocytes are the most plentiful type of cell in your skin, and they produce keratin, a structural protein that helps hold all your insides together. They’re strong little bastards, and if they’re hurt by ultrasound, you can bet that less structurally focused cells will suffer too. Mechanical damage... think of a scrape, just larger. Like large swaths of your skin. I don’t want to even contemplate eyeball damage."
UBeam: You Don't Even Want To Contemplate The Eyeball Damage!™
posted by Iridic at 6:32 PM on November 9, 2015 [21 favorites]
UBeam: You Don't Even Want To Contemplate The Eyeball Damage!™
posted by Iridic at 6:32 PM on November 9, 2015 [21 favorites]
I used an ultrasonic homogenizer in lab two years ago. We had to lock the doors, close and lock the lab rooms adjacent to the instrument, and hang signs in the hall warning people not to approach the door and definitely not to open the door. In the lab, we had to wear super burly ear protection or we could have gone deaf, apparently. All of this, just to homogenize 500ml beakers of hydrogel. Said beakers had to be placed in an ice bath during the homogenization process to keep them from boiling.
So yeah, would-be entrepreneurs, please don't fuck around with ultrasonic devices.
posted by feralscientist at 6:33 PM on November 9, 2015 [42 favorites]
So yeah, would-be entrepreneurs, please don't fuck around with ultrasonic devices.
posted by feralscientist at 6:33 PM on November 9, 2015 [42 favorites]
How do people fall for such obvious bullshit? If someone tells you they have this amazing invention that will change the world, but can't produce a working prototype, that should be the end of the story. If it's not BS they can come back when they have something working built.
How do investors fall for this?
posted by Sangermaine at 6:37 PM on November 9, 2015 [10 favorites]
How do investors fall for this?
posted by Sangermaine at 6:37 PM on November 9, 2015 [10 favorites]
As a sensible, reasonable, modern person, I view wireless induction charging as basically witchcraft.
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 6:38 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 6:38 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
Mod note: One comment deleted; if you have another good article just go ahead and link it, rather than getting into a back-and-forth over which site covered it first.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 6:43 PM on November 9, 2015
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 6:43 PM on November 9, 2015
It's nothing compared to my new ultra-efficient method of wireless charging via smells. The scent of peach schnapps seems to work best. Investors wanted.
posted by sfenders at 6:44 PM on November 9, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by sfenders at 6:44 PM on November 9, 2015 [6 favorites]
Yeah, there's also that "every time I charge my phone my cat pees and then faints" problem.
I think you mean opportunity.
posted by escabeche at 6:45 PM on November 9, 2015 [8 favorites]
I think you mean opportunity.
posted by escabeche at 6:45 PM on November 9, 2015 [8 favorites]
How do investors fall for this?Oh, well that's straightforward.
If you're an investor, it's your day job to hear people - often just kids - peddle what sounds like a bullshit but turns out to be a good idea. You just can't tell them apart. The same basic insight driving your startup can be expressed in a lot of different ways.
So there's a natural bias towards exciting ideas (wireless power!) and people who are confident and charismatic.
Sometimes you put money on "microwave on the outside" but sometimes you get "so you're going to convince total strangers to pick up other complete strangers, with their cars, over the internet".
posted by pmv at 6:46 PM on November 9, 2015 [8 favorites]
How do people fall for such obvious bullshit?The thought process seems to be: "If it's on Kickstarter, it must be true. If it's got VC funding, it must be doubly true".
c.f. Batteriser (& previously)
posted by Pinback at 6:48 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
The, the , the, Theranos!
posted by miyabo at 6:53 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by miyabo at 6:53 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
There's a lot of not-so-smart money making bets these days, and companies like Ubeam and Theranos go a long ways to tarnishing the idea of innovation in Silicon Valley. However, getting away from the money and towards the engineers, and there's a bit more realistic review of these companies. Even a year ago, How putting $10M into UBeam illustrates everything that is wrong with tech investing today was lampooning the insanity. The Hacker News discussion on it also contains many other examples ripe for schadenfreude.
posted by Llama-Lime at 7:08 PM on November 9, 2015 [7 favorites]
posted by Llama-Lime at 7:08 PM on November 9, 2015 [7 favorites]
It is completely impossible to me to see how ultrasound with enough energy to charge an item can do anything but bad things to living creatures. In order to send enough power to said device, you also have to allow for energy lost due to signal loss, entropy and such. So you can charge your phone cordlessly, cook an egg in the shell on your kitchen counter, and you get to die of cancer faster and more efficiently than ever before, amirite? At least the system I saw a year or two ago using a fluctuating EM field seems less directly lethal.
OTOH, if it will let me see through a visitor's clothing like X-Ray Specs, I think I might be willing to take the hit.
posted by Samizdata at 7:19 PM on November 9, 2015
OTOH, if it will let me see through a visitor's clothing like X-Ray Specs, I think I might be willing to take the hit.
posted by Samizdata at 7:19 PM on November 9, 2015
Last year they raised 10 million in a Series A round and in September they sold a convertable note for another 10 million. However that's debt, not prefferred shares for equity. They have 20 patents which could be sold by the bankers to recoup losses. With recent patent portfolios going for $1million a patent, one can see how they got their loan.
posted by humanfont at 7:19 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by humanfont at 7:19 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
Of course there are potential issues... however, those issues are potential, and there might be ways to design around them.
Obviously, extremely loud ultrasound might be as bad as extremely loud sound... or even significantly more so. But perhaps there are ways to reduce that risk and reduce the decibels, perhaps using ways of focusing sound better? For instance, there are presumably ways to get ultrasound to behave similar to parametric speakers, which could be used to create rather targeted hot spots of ultrasound. Similarly, perhaps there are ways of focusing the sensitivity of ultrasound vibrations... kind of an electronic version of an ear horn, creating an environment where ultrasound resonates more intensely.
Perhaps there could also be something like a battery on the receiving end, powering various means of receiving the ultrasound as energy in a way that's not so dangerously overpowered, and charging back once power has been created.
We are talking about something that nobody thought could be done, but which apparently can. It seems to me that the business has a bit of a vested interest in giving you information on how it works that obviously, on the surface, sounds impossible. I mean, who'd compete against them on something so foolhardy? And yet, in the neighborhood of where the ultrasonic is converted to power, they could be essentially accurate.
But the thing is, unless you know the real specifics of how this works, couldn't you essentially be comparing the sound of a nuclear explosion at close range to something which is far more benign? Are you sure you aren't making assumptions as to the environment needed near the reciever vs. the general environment around it?
posted by markkraft at 7:28 PM on November 9, 2015
Obviously, extremely loud ultrasound might be as bad as extremely loud sound... or even significantly more so. But perhaps there are ways to reduce that risk and reduce the decibels, perhaps using ways of focusing sound better? For instance, there are presumably ways to get ultrasound to behave similar to parametric speakers, which could be used to create rather targeted hot spots of ultrasound. Similarly, perhaps there are ways of focusing the sensitivity of ultrasound vibrations... kind of an electronic version of an ear horn, creating an environment where ultrasound resonates more intensely.
Perhaps there could also be something like a battery on the receiving end, powering various means of receiving the ultrasound as energy in a way that's not so dangerously overpowered, and charging back once power has been created.
We are talking about something that nobody thought could be done, but which apparently can. It seems to me that the business has a bit of a vested interest in giving you information on how it works that obviously, on the surface, sounds impossible. I mean, who'd compete against them on something so foolhardy? And yet, in the neighborhood of where the ultrasonic is converted to power, they could be essentially accurate.
But the thing is, unless you know the real specifics of how this works, couldn't you essentially be comparing the sound of a nuclear explosion at close range to something which is far more benign? Are you sure you aren't making assumptions as to the environment needed near the reciever vs. the general environment around it?
posted by markkraft at 7:28 PM on November 9, 2015
I think you mean opportunity.
What is a problem, after all, but an opportunity disguised as a semi-conscious cat peeing all over your living room?
posted by clockzero at 7:34 PM on November 9, 2015 [20 favorites]
What is a problem, after all, but an opportunity disguised as a semi-conscious cat peeing all over your living room?
posted by clockzero at 7:34 PM on November 9, 2015 [20 favorites]
From the video: "let's see, we've got approximately 8 volts right now that we're generating at this distance, and to charge an iPhone you only need 5 volts."
Arrrrggh that is NOT HOW ELECTRICAL ENERGY WORKS.
posted by teraflop at 7:34 PM on November 9, 2015 [41 favorites]
Arrrrggh that is NOT HOW ELECTRICAL ENERGY WORKS.
posted by teraflop at 7:34 PM on November 9, 2015 [41 favorites]
Along with the Theranos debunking, it's been a busy few weeks for commonsense. Still waiting for the penny to drop for Soylent and Thync.
This kind of fluff seems to go along with peaking bubble times. I'm reminded of several Dotcom-era spectaculars. Everyone remembers Enron, of course, and Worldcom, but what about Magic Box and Pixelon, DEN, Adams, etc. We're long overdue for a cull.
posted by meehawl at 7:40 PM on November 9, 2015 [9 favorites]
This kind of fluff seems to go along with peaking bubble times. I'm reminded of several Dotcom-era spectaculars. Everyone remembers Enron, of course, and Worldcom, but what about Magic Box and Pixelon, DEN, Adams, etc. We're long overdue for a cull.
posted by meehawl at 7:40 PM on November 9, 2015 [9 favorites]
Arrrrggh that is NOT HOW ELECTRICAL ENERGY WORKS.
C'mon, the idea has a lot of potential.
posted by 7segment at 7:46 PM on November 9, 2015 [42 favorites]
C'mon, the idea has a lot of potential.
posted by 7segment at 7:46 PM on November 9, 2015 [42 favorites]
Arrrrggh that is NOT HOW ELECTRICAL ENERGY WORKS.
My biggest takeaway from grade school physics was my teacher repeating the mantra: "It's the amps that'll kill ya."
posted by jimmythefish at 7:53 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
My biggest takeaway from grade school physics was my teacher repeating the mantra: "It's the amps that'll kill ya."
posted by jimmythefish at 7:53 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
"The problem is that most of the power is lost as sound is transmitted from speaker to microphone. I still think the primary purpose for this stuff is weapons, but there may be useful spinoffs for the civilian audio industry."
I'm not doubting that it would be considerably less efficient... but hey, I live with people who refuse to even hook their desktop systems up to a nearby ethernet cable, because WiFi... and then complain about their internet. *shrugs*
It seems to me that most people don't care about the power draw or mind the waste, because they'd fundamentally prefer to save the effort of accounting for what they actually spend their money on. It all just gets added on to the bill anyway, and it couldn't be much worse than the refrigerator, right?!
"what happens if one element of the phased array fails, or the beam steering system points the beam in the wrong direction?"
Hopefully, it has self-diagnostics which stop transmitting until things check out. Again, this is a good argument for having some kind of battery at the receiver end, kind of like a low-end UPS.
And yeah, this is likely to be a pricey and wasteful geektoy -- and, yes, a lot of money might be in how these patents are used for military applications -- but the smart folks will still rely on the good ol' copper cable... and probably be ridiculed for it too.
posted by markkraft at 8:03 PM on November 9, 2015
I'm not doubting that it would be considerably less efficient... but hey, I live with people who refuse to even hook their desktop systems up to a nearby ethernet cable, because WiFi... and then complain about their internet. *shrugs*
It seems to me that most people don't care about the power draw or mind the waste, because they'd fundamentally prefer to save the effort of accounting for what they actually spend their money on. It all just gets added on to the bill anyway, and it couldn't be much worse than the refrigerator, right?!
"what happens if one element of the phased array fails, or the beam steering system points the beam in the wrong direction?"
Hopefully, it has self-diagnostics which stop transmitting until things check out. Again, this is a good argument for having some kind of battery at the receiver end, kind of like a low-end UPS.
And yeah, this is likely to be a pricey and wasteful geektoy -- and, yes, a lot of money might be in how these patents are used for military applications -- but the smart folks will still rely on the good ol' copper cable... and probably be ridiculed for it too.
posted by markkraft at 8:03 PM on November 9, 2015
So, the physics of this involves shoving air around hard enough that you get 1% of the mechanical work through the system... if you need 10 watts out, that's 990 watts of heating the air, discounting the obvious dangers to nearby structures, etc.
Conspiracy theory angle - what if it turns out to be non-linear and causes fusion along the way?
posted by MikeWarot at 8:09 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
Conspiracy theory angle - what if it turns out to be non-linear and causes fusion along the way?
posted by MikeWarot at 8:09 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
Really, though, this is horribly impractical and wasteful, even if it does work.
If they wanted to create something green and efficient, they'd modify this to create energy by soundwaves. Think about it... self-charging electric public transit, where riders are encouraged to be even more impolite than usual.
Is your laptop battery running low? There's a green solution.
"Low battery?! F*cking piece of S**T!!"
posted by markkraft at 8:14 PM on November 9, 2015 [4 favorites]
If they wanted to create something green and efficient, they'd modify this to create energy by soundwaves. Think about it... self-charging electric public transit, where riders are encouraged to be even more impolite than usual.
Is your laptop battery running low? There's a green solution.
"Low battery?! F*cking piece of S**T!!"
posted by markkraft at 8:14 PM on November 9, 2015 [4 favorites]
Magic is so much more attractive than basic practical physics. Given that all energy transfer is inefficient why would you go from AC to DC to transducer to air to transducer to DC just to avoid a couple of wires? 'Cause it's magical!
posted by njohnson23 at 8:45 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by njohnson23 at 8:45 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
How long until somebody without scruples starts a Kickstarter for an AMAZING PHONE CHARGER that lets you put your phone in a special case and charge it in 55.675 seconds just by putting it in the microwave?
posted by mccarty.tim at 8:50 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by mccarty.tim at 8:50 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
Ultrasound? Pffft. Infrasound is where it's at. That's the real reason old analog synthesizers cost so much used--vintage LFOs have iPhone charging characteristics that can't be duplicated by modern circuitry.
posted by infinitewindow at 8:53 PM on November 9, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by infinitewindow at 8:53 PM on November 9, 2015 [5 favorites]
You know, you could easily buy a bunch of 1W laser diodes and make yourself a demo that would wirelessly charge a phone with lasers, but you could never make such a thing into a consumer product because there would be no way to make it safe. Once you reach certain levels of intensity, 'we're going to be really careful where we point it' ceases to be an acceptable safety measure.
posted by Pyry at 8:55 PM on November 9, 2015 [12 favorites]
posted by Pyry at 8:55 PM on November 9, 2015 [12 favorites]
I told my contractors it was an underfloor heating system but actually it's the world's biggest induction charger. Also you're not wearing a watch are you? No? Good. Pacemaker?
posted by GuyZero at 8:56 PM on November 9, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by GuyZero at 8:56 PM on November 9, 2015 [6 favorites]
I see you've noticed the St. Elmo's fire streaming from your umbrella tip! No need to worry, just avoid holding anything conductive in a vertical orientation. I've turned my entire house into a giant capacitor. It's much more convenient than wires I assure you. In fact, I've gotten rid of every single wire! Mainly because they would burst into flames from resistive heating.
posted by Pyry at 9:06 PM on November 9, 2015 [18 favorites]
posted by Pyry at 9:06 PM on November 9, 2015 [18 favorites]
You know, you could easily buy a bunch of 1W laser diodes and make yourself a demo that would wirelessly charge a phone with lasers
Are you telling me the Death Star started life as an orbital charging platform?
posted by axiom at 9:10 PM on November 9, 2015 [7 favorites]
Are you telling me the Death Star started life as an orbital charging platform?
posted by axiom at 9:10 PM on November 9, 2015 [7 favorites]
Wait, how exactly do electrical outlets spread bacteria??
posted by Naberius at 9:39 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Naberius at 9:39 PM on November 9, 2015 [2 favorites]
Naberius: "Wait, how exactly do electrical outlets spread bacteria??"
Bacterions pass up the wire from the negative end to the positive end (though it must be noted that, for historical reasons, electrical bioengineers reverse the symbols, treating circuits as if they were passing healthons from the positive end to the negative end).
posted by Bugbread at 10:03 PM on November 9, 2015 [35 favorites]
Bacterions pass up the wire from the negative end to the positive end (though it must be noted that, for historical reasons, electrical bioengineers reverse the symbols, treating circuits as if they were passing healthons from the positive end to the negative end).
posted by Bugbread at 10:03 PM on November 9, 2015 [35 favorites]
Look, everything else has already been disrupted by tech companies. Disrupting cell structure is the logical next step.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 10:30 PM on November 9, 2015 [11 favorites]
posted by Hairy Lobster at 10:30 PM on November 9, 2015 [11 favorites]
"Ultrasound? Pffft. Infrasound is where it's at."
Turns out the ideal frequency for sound based energy transfer is the brown note.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 10:32 PM on November 9, 2015 [4 favorites]
Turns out the ideal frequency for sound based energy transfer is the brown note.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 10:32 PM on November 9, 2015 [4 favorites]
Honey you've been in there fifteen minutes...
I'm just charging my phone, be out in a sec.
posted by Oyéah at 10:41 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
I'm just charging my phone, be out in a sec.
posted by Oyéah at 10:41 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
How long until somebody without scruples starts a Kickstarter for an AMAZING PHONE CHARGER that lets you put your phone in a special case and charge it in 55.675 seconds just by putting it in the microwave?
That functionality was baked into the iPhone 6 and unlocked in the iOS8 release.
posted by sebastienbailard at 10:46 PM on November 9, 2015
That functionality was baked into the iPhone 6 and unlocked in the iOS8 release.
posted by sebastienbailard at 10:46 PM on November 9, 2015
Ultrasound? Pffft. Infrasound is where it's at.
Yeah but then you've got the problem of making your elephants pee then faint. You do not want this to happen. Trust me.
posted by scalefree at 10:54 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
Yeah but then you've got the problem of making your elephants pee then faint. You do not want this to happen. Trust me.
posted by scalefree at 10:54 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
You just need to vibrate the charging surface at the right (range of) frequency to spin around the little weight-on-a-motor that's your phone's vibrator. Which you can also do manually just by shaking your hand back and forth vigorously.
With some practice, I learned to perform this useful trick while my phone's in my pocket.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it, officer.
posted by sebastienbailard at 11:08 PM on November 9, 2015 [4 favorites]
With some practice, I learned to perform this useful trick while my phone's in my pocket.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it, officer.
posted by sebastienbailard at 11:08 PM on November 9, 2015 [4 favorites]
Brown note? Pffft.
posted by quinndexter at 11:22 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by quinndexter at 11:22 PM on November 9, 2015 [1 favorite]
Cough Orbo cough
posted by GallonOfAlan at 11:48 PM on November 9, 2015
posted by GallonOfAlan at 11:48 PM on November 9, 2015
How do investors fall for this?
The usual way: blind greed.
posted by five fresh fish at 11:57 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
The usual way: blind greed.
posted by five fresh fish at 11:57 PM on November 9, 2015 [3 favorites]
....outperforms every other possible wireless power system in every category...
Even schadenfreude.
posted by StickyCarpet at 12:01 AM on November 10, 2015
Even schadenfreude.
posted by StickyCarpet at 12:01 AM on November 10, 2015
Mod note: A couple of comments deleted. If your comment is some variant of "probably because she's a woman," don't bother posting.
posted by taz (staff) at 12:40 AM on November 10, 2015 [11 favorites]
posted by taz (staff) at 12:40 AM on November 10, 2015 [11 favorites]
I imagine it would be more energy efficient if they used a fan on one side of the room, and a pinwheel attached to a coil on the other. That way, it's white noise, and you can get a pleasant nap in while charging.
posted by jenkinsEar at 3:08 AM on November 10, 2015 [7 favorites]
posted by jenkinsEar at 3:08 AM on November 10, 2015 [7 favorites]
I'll be selling an advanced "physical interface" add-on product for this that can be positioned along the line of sight to more than quadruple your charging speed. I call it the brUmstck™.
posted by lucidium at 5:16 AM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by lucidium at 5:16 AM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
How long until somebody without scruples starts a Kickstarter for an AMAZING PHONE CHARGER that lets you put your phone in a special case and charge it in 55.675 seconds just by putting it in the microwave?
That would make more sense than this scheme at least. The biggest problem would be entering so many significant digits on most microwave keypads.
posted by TedW at 5:59 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
That would make more sense than this scheme at least. The biggest problem would be entering so many significant digits on most microwave keypads.
posted by TedW at 5:59 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
escabeche: "I think you mean opportunity."
I some languages, the word for "cat piss" is the same as the word for "opportunity".
posted by Rock Steady at 6:32 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
I some languages, the word for "cat piss" is the same as the word for "opportunity".
posted by Rock Steady at 6:32 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
I some languages, the word for "cat piss" is the same as the word for "opportunity".
So, the Chinese character for "Ultrasound" is a combination of "I've fleeced a venture capitalist" and "the cat peed on the carpet"?
I suspect that's not true.
posted by mhoye at 6:45 AM on November 10, 2015 [3 favorites]
So, the Chinese character for "Ultrasound" is a combination of "I've fleeced a venture capitalist" and "the cat peed on the carpet"?
I suspect that's not true.
posted by mhoye at 6:45 AM on November 10, 2015 [3 favorites]
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe: Battery packs on fire, frayed low voltage cables. I watched U-beams glitter in the dark on my nightstand. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears...in...rain. Time to charge my phone.
posted by blue_beetle at 7:18 AM on November 10, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by blue_beetle at 7:18 AM on November 10, 2015 [6 favorites]
This company is almost certainly a scam, but there have been a ton of energy harvesting systems showing up in electronic component catalogs lately. Powering buses with screaming passengers is not so far from what can be done (powering a tiny chip).
Sorry for the lack of proper terminology, my memory is kinda messed up.
A coworker got this little component that looks like a little cube with a steel whisker coming out. The whisker is like the arm of a metronome, with a sliding weight to change its resonant frequency. You stick the component on any machine that generates vibration, in this case an AC unit motor housing. You tune the device to the machine. It will use the whisker to harvest energy from the waste vibrations.
In this case enough energy is harvested to drip charge a super capacitor that periodically powers up some sensors and a microcontroller. The micro is WiFi enabled, and sends the data to a server.
Super easy wireless instrumentation.
This thing is directly attached to a big ass vibrating motor, and it barely harvest enough energy to squirt a few bytes over WiFi every 5 minutes or so.
There are MEMS versions of these systems that are a few mm square, and giant versions for industry.
Maybe if you attach a big ass tuning fork to your phone this could be possible?
posted by Doroteo Arango II at 7:59 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
Sorry for the lack of proper terminology, my memory is kinda messed up.
A coworker got this little component that looks like a little cube with a steel whisker coming out. The whisker is like the arm of a metronome, with a sliding weight to change its resonant frequency. You stick the component on any machine that generates vibration, in this case an AC unit motor housing. You tune the device to the machine. It will use the whisker to harvest energy from the waste vibrations.
In this case enough energy is harvested to drip charge a super capacitor that periodically powers up some sensors and a microcontroller. The micro is WiFi enabled, and sends the data to a server.
Super easy wireless instrumentation.
This thing is directly attached to a big ass vibrating motor, and it barely harvest enough energy to squirt a few bytes over WiFi every 5 minutes or so.
There are MEMS versions of these systems that are a few mm square, and giant versions for industry.
Maybe if you attach a big ass tuning fork to your phone this could be possible?
posted by Doroteo Arango II at 7:59 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
As I understand it (please, anyone who is actually Silicon Valley rather than just Silicon Valley-adjacent feel free to correct me), Silicon Valley venture capitalists work by a strategy sort of like how crabs reproduce. They've got a lot of money (something like 70% of all venture capitalist money in America is in Silicon Valley), each startup is fairly cheap in terms relative to that pile of money, and so they fairly indiscriminately produce large numbers of baby startups with the knowledge that most of them will fail. Nevertheless, they still have criteria they use to choose who they fund. Do the founders have degrees from Stanford? Did they drop out of Stanford? Are they young, are they male, are they white, do they wear hoodies to business meetings, etc. etc. You don't have to have meet all of those criteria to get funding, but the more you have, the more likely you are to get funded. The important thing to note, though, is that none of the criteria determining whether a baby startup can get funding have anything to do with the product being made or its physical feasibility. The products of most startups are in some way or another non-feasible; you know this because most startups fail.
If venture capitalists were running a strategy like human reproduction rather than crab reproduction — a "put all your eggs in one basket and then watch that basket" strategy, rather than a "scatter eggs indiscriminately across the sea floor and hope that one or two of them survive" strategy — it would make monetary sense for them to research whether the things they're funding are physically possible. But that's not the strategy they're running, and so assessing potential startups by whether or not their products could hypothetically work is a waste of time.
This suggest to me the following broad-strokes strategy:
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 9:03 AM on November 10, 2015 [14 favorites]
If venture capitalists were running a strategy like human reproduction rather than crab reproduction — a "put all your eggs in one basket and then watch that basket" strategy, rather than a "scatter eggs indiscriminately across the sea floor and hope that one or two of them survive" strategy — it would make monetary sense for them to research whether the things they're funding are physically possible. But that's not the strategy they're running, and so assessing potential startups by whether or not their products could hypothetically work is a waste of time.
This suggest to me the following broad-strokes strategy:
- Somehow fake being a Stanford graduate or dropout. Compose a résumé made entirely of lies and forge whatever documentation you need, or else bring in an actual Stanford graduate/dropout to serve as your frontman for a piece of the take.
- Pitch a business plan, any business plan, to as many Sand Hill Road firms as you can. It doesn't matter what the product you're making is. All that matters is that hypothetically you are making something that could potentially, if actually made, have some use-value to someone somewhere. The details of the specific use value are irrelevant, so long as you or your hired gun Stanford guy looks good in a hoodie.
- Get a check. If it's not big enough, go through the motions of researching/producing that product until you receive a sufficiently large check.
- Deposit that check somewhere safe. I admit I don't know what details are involved here; you will have to have someone on your team with relatively deep knowledge of how offshore banking works.
- For all I know this may be one of the use cases where Bitcoin makes sense.
- Once the money is stashed, your entire team gets on a flight from San Jose to Vancouver, BC,
- Once in Vancouver, they then board a plane to Havana.
- Viva La Revolución!
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 9:03 AM on November 10, 2015 [14 favorites]
Except for the Cuba part, that seems to be the exact M.O. of Theranos (cargo cult startup).
posted by benzenedream at 9:35 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by benzenedream at 9:35 AM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
If venture capitalists were running a strategy like human reproduction rather than crab reproduction — a "put all your eggs in one basket and then watch that basket" strategy, rather than a "scatter eggs indiscriminately across the sea floor and hope that one or two of them survive" strategy — it would make monetary sense for them to research whether the things they're funding are physically possible. But that's not the strategy they're running, and so assessing potential startups by whether or not their products could hypothetically work is a waste of time.
I get the sense you think you're joking.
posted by GuyZero at 9:41 AM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
I get the sense you think you're joking.
posted by GuyZero at 9:41 AM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
well, someone's certainly joking. I'm not sure how funny the joke is, though.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 9:46 AM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 9:46 AM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
What is a problem, after all, but an opportunity disguised as a semi-conscious cat peeing all over your living room?
at this very moment my team is working on a pitch for our plan to disrupt kitty litter
posted by poffin boffin at 10:25 AM on November 10, 2015 [5 favorites]
at this very moment my team is working on a pitch for our plan to disrupt kitty litter
posted by poffin boffin at 10:25 AM on November 10, 2015 [5 favorites]
So, healthy skepticism is healthy.
But wireless power isn't new, and isn't magic. I personally wouldn't bet against USB charging becoming obsolete within our lifetimes.
It's easy to underestimate the cumulative power of Moore's Law, which also has huge implications for power usage. Researchers are already building devices that harvest power from the same radio waves they use to communicate. (SLYT)
Finally, most VCs are not dumb and/or terrible people. The ones that are don't last long.
posted by ArmandoAkimbo at 10:59 AM on November 10, 2015
But wireless power isn't new, and isn't magic. I personally wouldn't bet against USB charging becoming obsolete within our lifetimes.
It's easy to underestimate the cumulative power of Moore's Law, which also has huge implications for power usage. Researchers are already building devices that harvest power from the same radio waves they use to communicate. (SLYT)
Finally, most VCs are not dumb and/or terrible people. The ones that are don't last long.
posted by ArmandoAkimbo at 10:59 AM on November 10, 2015
The proto-product itself reads like a soon-to-fail-kickstarter, but good luck to them. The aim of the hullabaloo [Read the EEVBlog conclusion, part 13] smells a lot more like Truth In Technology Journalism than the technology itself. Why are people so eager to take down a person/company talking about something they are possibly developing?
posted by concavity at 11:13 AM on November 10, 2015
posted by concavity at 11:13 AM on November 10, 2015
because the scamminess is so pervasive down here that not even the people running the scams admits to themselves what they're doing.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 12:05 PM on November 10, 2015
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 12:05 PM on November 10, 2015
Tony Hsieh gave money to this because he is a crazy person who won the lottery. Why on earth, though, did Andreessen Horowitz give money to this? I am absolutely willing to listen to hypotheses other than the hypothesis that the actual physical feasibility of a startup's product is not important to whether or not that startup gets funded. But I just can't figure out what those other hypotheses might be.
I mean basically I'm trying to get away from the "lol VCs are stupid" frame, because I think there is a logic to what they're doing and I do think that logic is in its way sound. It's just that I don't think what they're doing (circulating money through a particular small group of elites) matches what they present themselves as doing (funding projects to develop new products).
If one could in fact convincingly present oneself as a valid member of that group of elites, with a business plan that's written like a business plan and believable as a business plan, then one could get money out of them regardless of whether or not your very convincing business-plan-like object is actually possible in the universe we live in.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 12:23 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
I mean basically I'm trying to get away from the "lol VCs are stupid" frame, because I think there is a logic to what they're doing and I do think that logic is in its way sound. It's just that I don't think what they're doing (circulating money through a particular small group of elites) matches what they present themselves as doing (funding projects to develop new products).
If one could in fact convincingly present oneself as a valid member of that group of elites, with a business plan that's written like a business plan and believable as a business plan, then one could get money out of them regardless of whether or not your very convincing business-plan-like object is actually possible in the universe we live in.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 12:23 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
My energy startup will use ambient noise to provide wireless power when you are at a busy restaurant or a ted talk.
posted by humanfont at 12:25 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by humanfont at 12:25 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
But wireless power isn't new, and isn't magic.
AND YET. And yet there are still very few commercial implementations of it and the ones that exist don't work that well. Could there be a reason? Could that reason be the laws of physics?
Per the EEVBlog analysis, it only takes a little undergrad math to prove that there are some serious issues with any wireless power scheme. Also, the whole thing where any sufficiently good wireless power scheme is also an amazing energy weapon.
posted by GuyZero at 12:27 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
AND YET. And yet there are still very few commercial implementations of it and the ones that exist don't work that well. Could there be a reason? Could that reason be the laws of physics?
Per the EEVBlog analysis, it only takes a little undergrad math to prove that there are some serious issues with any wireless power scheme. Also, the whole thing where any sufficiently good wireless power scheme is also an amazing energy weapon.
posted by GuyZero at 12:27 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
ArmandoAkimbo: “Finally, most VCs are not dumb and/or terrible people. The ones that are don't last long.”
Ha. Ha, ha, ha. Right.
Another vaporware product attracting attention in Silicon Valley isn't really news, at this point. What's interesting in this case is the person pitching it – Meredith Perry, who manages to parlay a real hostility to hard science and engineering into a fancy Silicon-Valley-friendly elevator pitch. In her Ted talk "How To Be a Technology Innovator" (!) she brags about how her university physics professor told her flatly that her idea is impossible, and adduces examples of inventions by non-experts (breathe-right nasal strips!) to try to demonstrate that expertise just slows you down by forcing you to think in "systems." She paints scientists as nay-saying goons without imagination who don't really build or solve anything. It's a bit maddening, honestly.
You Can't Tip a Buick: “Tony Hsieh gave money to this because he is a crazy person who won the lottery. Why on earth, though, did Andreessen Horowitz give money to this?”
The surface explanation is: she's a kid who takes experts who know what they're talking about and tell her something is impossible as an insult, and responds stubbornly that she can do these impossible things. Inspirational! The actual explanation, however, was given by humanfont above: it's a safe investment. It's just a loan secured by patents.
posted by koeselitz at 12:28 PM on November 10, 2015 [4 favorites]
Ha. Ha, ha, ha. Right.
Another vaporware product attracting attention in Silicon Valley isn't really news, at this point. What's interesting in this case is the person pitching it – Meredith Perry, who manages to parlay a real hostility to hard science and engineering into a fancy Silicon-Valley-friendly elevator pitch. In her Ted talk "How To Be a Technology Innovator" (!) she brags about how her university physics professor told her flatly that her idea is impossible, and adduces examples of inventions by non-experts (breathe-right nasal strips!) to try to demonstrate that expertise just slows you down by forcing you to think in "systems." She paints scientists as nay-saying goons without imagination who don't really build or solve anything. It's a bit maddening, honestly.
You Can't Tip a Buick: “Tony Hsieh gave money to this because he is a crazy person who won the lottery. Why on earth, though, did Andreessen Horowitz give money to this?”
The surface explanation is: she's a kid who takes experts who know what they're talking about and tell her something is impossible as an insult, and responds stubbornly that she can do these impossible things. Inspirational! The actual explanation, however, was given by humanfont above: it's a safe investment. It's just a loan secured by patents.
posted by koeselitz at 12:28 PM on November 10, 2015 [4 favorites]
I think @meredithperry @ubeam could be the worlds next Elizabeth @theranos. Remarkable visionary, changing the world @msuster @OurCrowd
posted by benzenedream at 12:55 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by benzenedream at 12:55 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
at this very moment my team is working on a pitch for our plan to disrupt kitty litter
Elimination commeownication?
posted by en forme de poire at 12:57 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
Elimination commeownication?
posted by en forme de poire at 12:57 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
but it seems extremely unlikely that Perry herself is a fraud.
perhaps the norms of a given environment can become so detached from any underlying reality that people who (diligently, non-fraudulently) perform the role given to them within that environment end up in real terms committing fraud. If the way to get money in Silicon Valley is to boldly assert that impossible is nothing — that "impossible" is not a valid word in Bay Aryan English — while diligently building the proper social connections (get admitted to Stanford, buy and wear cheap hoodies and expensive jeans, network with other Stanford people, drop out at just the right moment, look good in interviews on Sand Hill Road), one can do all of those things without sparing a moment's thought to the idea that the things the Silicon Valley money men award cash to could be in real terms (rather than Silicon Valley terms) fraudulent.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 1:26 PM on November 10, 2015
perhaps the norms of a given environment can become so detached from any underlying reality that people who (diligently, non-fraudulently) perform the role given to them within that environment end up in real terms committing fraud. If the way to get money in Silicon Valley is to boldly assert that impossible is nothing — that "impossible" is not a valid word in Bay Aryan English — while diligently building the proper social connections (get admitted to Stanford, buy and wear cheap hoodies and expensive jeans, network with other Stanford people, drop out at just the right moment, look good in interviews on Sand Hill Road), one can do all of those things without sparing a moment's thought to the idea that the things the Silicon Valley money men award cash to could be in real terms (rather than Silicon Valley terms) fraudulent.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 1:26 PM on November 10, 2015
If one could in fact convincingly present oneself as a valid member of that group of elites, with a business plan that's written like a business plan and believable as a business plan, then one could get money out of them regardless of whether or not your very convincing business-plan-like object is actually possible in the universe we live in.
Please double-check that your science-widget doesn't actually work! There's nothing more irritating than embezzling millions only to accidentally build a working free-energy device, with a dozen investors peering in through the mail slot, each promised 95%+ of the profit.
posted by sebastienbailard at 1:49 PM on November 10, 2015 [3 favorites]
Please double-check that your science-widget doesn't actually work! There's nothing more irritating than embezzling millions only to accidentally build a working free-energy device, with a dozen investors peering in through the mail slot, each promised 95%+ of the profit.
posted by sebastienbailard at 1:49 PM on November 10, 2015 [3 favorites]
Springtime for Wireless Charging.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 1:55 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 1:55 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
This is, IMO, what the actual collapse of SV will look like. People will repeatedly get funding for relatively high profile bullshit products/services that don't just fail, but were patently impossible to ever produce or operate in the first place.
I know stuff fails there all the time, but i mean things that could just straight up never work getting HUGE funding and then imploding.
Like, some company getting 100 million next week for a brain interfaced smartphone, or something. Stuff that's front page internet news but can't be built at all.
Then the money will dry up, because the bars you have to clear to receive any will get WAY higher.
posted by emptythought at 2:04 PM on November 10, 2015
I know stuff fails there all the time, but i mean things that could just straight up never work getting HUGE funding and then imploding.
Like, some company getting 100 million next week for a brain interfaced smartphone, or something. Stuff that's front page internet news but can't be built at all.
Then the money will dry up, because the bars you have to clear to receive any will get WAY higher.
posted by emptythought at 2:04 PM on November 10, 2015
Meredith Perry took to Twitter to update the world on uBeam just yesterday
1/ Saturday we released some of @ubeam's critical tech specs & designs to offer some insight into what we've built. http://techcrunch.com/2015/11/07/wireless-power-charger/
2/Some challenges we had 2 overcome to make @uBeam viable: impedancemismatch/aircoupling/beamforming/acoustic losses/low power rectification
3/Thru yrs of development & hard work, our team of brilliant engineers/scientists developed& realized solutions to the following challenges:
4/Built novel high powered air-coupled ultrasonic txt, operates btwn 45-75 kHz, output btwn 145dB – 155dB (=316 W/m2 – 3kW/m2). Took 3 yrs
5/Built phased array transmitter w 1000s of individually addressable & controllable elements that enable us to beam power over 1-4m radius
6/ Develop a detection and tracking system to precisely locate receiving electronic devices in air in real-time
7/ Develop beamforming algorithms that can shape & steer multiple focused beams to several moving devices based on their loc & size in space
7/Build receiver that harvests & convert acoustic power w multiple focused beams hitting Rx @ multiple angles, while Rx itself is in motion
(yes, there are two 7's.)
Anyway, yes just because something is hard or complex doesn't make it impossible. Maybe there's some huge breakthroughs here. But wireless power transmission will always be an uphill battle against physics.
But from the TechCrunch article:
uBeam is designed to deliver a minimum of 1.5 watts of electricity to smartphones
I dunno, it seems like a lot of work for 1.5W. Some companies have given up with inductive charger support in their phones - how are you going to convince them to give you an entire CC of phone volume to get 1.5W sometimes in some places? I kind of want to believe but I don't see it yet.
posted by GuyZero at 2:15 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
1/ Saturday we released some of @ubeam's critical tech specs & designs to offer some insight into what we've built. http://techcrunch.com/2015/11/07/wireless-power-charger/
2/Some challenges we had 2 overcome to make @uBeam viable: impedancemismatch/aircoupling/beamforming/acoustic losses/low power rectification
3/Thru yrs of development & hard work, our team of brilliant engineers/scientists developed& realized solutions to the following challenges:
4/Built novel high powered air-coupled ultrasonic txt, operates btwn 45-75 kHz, output btwn 145dB – 155dB (=316 W/m2 – 3kW/m2). Took 3 yrs
5/Built phased array transmitter w 1000s of individually addressable & controllable elements that enable us to beam power over 1-4m radius
6/ Develop a detection and tracking system to precisely locate receiving electronic devices in air in real-time
7/ Develop beamforming algorithms that can shape & steer multiple focused beams to several moving devices based on their loc & size in space
7/Build receiver that harvests & convert acoustic power w multiple focused beams hitting Rx @ multiple angles, while Rx itself is in motion
(yes, there are two 7's.)
Anyway, yes just because something is hard or complex doesn't make it impossible. Maybe there's some huge breakthroughs here. But wireless power transmission will always be an uphill battle against physics.
But from the TechCrunch article:
uBeam is designed to deliver a minimum of 1.5 watts of electricity to smartphones
I dunno, it seems like a lot of work for 1.5W. Some companies have given up with inductive charger support in their phones - how are you going to convince them to give you an entire CC of phone volume to get 1.5W sometimes in some places? I kind of want to believe but I don't see it yet.
posted by GuyZero at 2:15 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
I know stuff fails there all the time, but i mean things that could just straight up never work getting HUGE funding and then imploding.Nah, people don't invest in things that they're not convinced have the potential of a return.
Then the money will dry up, because the bars you have to clear to receive any will get WAY higher.Right, people don't invest in things that they're not convinced have the potential of a return.
posted by ArmandoAkimbo at 2:15 PM on November 10, 2015
Then the money will dry up, because the bars you have to clear to receive any will get WAY higher.
haha, nope.
The money will keep flowing faster than ever as public market returns languish and investors desperately seek any source of higher returns.
posted by GuyZero at 2:16 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
haha, nope.
The money will keep flowing faster than ever as public market returns languish and investors desperately seek any source of higher returns.
posted by GuyZero at 2:16 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
I don't think anyone is disputing that it's broadly possible to charge your phone with a sonic death ray. What people are disputing is whether it's a good idea to charge your phone with a sonic death ray.
posted by Pyry at 2:29 PM on November 10, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by Pyry at 2:29 PM on November 10, 2015 [5 favorites]
7/ Develop beamforming algorithms that can shape & steer multiple focused beams to several moving devices based on their loc & size in space
If they marketed this as a mosquito killer I'm in. Death ray/phone charger, not so much.
posted by benzenedream at 2:38 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
If they marketed this as a mosquito killer I'm in. Death ray/phone charger, not so much.
posted by benzenedream at 2:38 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
b1tr0t: “Except that Perry was an astrobiologist at NASA and then a STEM Student Ambassador for NASA. She also won a crazy number of awards and scholarships before starting UBeam. I'm not certain that UBeam is exactly what it seems to be, but it seems extremely unlikely that Perry herself is a fraud.”
I never said she was a fraud. I said nothing of the kind. She never lied – I didn't say she did. She's just anti-scientific, and moreover she's flat wrong about whether what she wants to do can be done.
Moreover, she was "an astrobiologist at NASA" in the sense that she did a summer internship as an undergraduate – which is great, but utterly different than saying that she was employed for her scientific credentials. I'm not sure what the "crazy number of awards and scholarships" were, but I would wonder about those, too, given her apparent skill at self-promotion.
And even if she'd won dozens of awards and been a Ph D in astrobiology, though, it wouldn't matter. Linus Pauling was a brilliant scientist and the only man to win two separate unshared Nobel prizes, but he turned into a total crackpot about Vitamin C, swearing it was a cure for cancer.
In any case: no, she's not a "fraud." She's just wrong. Very, very wrong. Wrong in a way that happens to be very attractive to VCs.
posted by koeselitz at 3:51 PM on November 10, 2015 [8 favorites]
I never said she was a fraud. I said nothing of the kind. She never lied – I didn't say she did. She's just anti-scientific, and moreover she's flat wrong about whether what she wants to do can be done.
Moreover, she was "an astrobiologist at NASA" in the sense that she did a summer internship as an undergraduate – which is great, but utterly different than saying that she was employed for her scientific credentials. I'm not sure what the "crazy number of awards and scholarships" were, but I would wonder about those, too, given her apparent skill at self-promotion.
And even if she'd won dozens of awards and been a Ph D in astrobiology, though, it wouldn't matter. Linus Pauling was a brilliant scientist and the only man to win two separate unshared Nobel prizes, but he turned into a total crackpot about Vitamin C, swearing it was a cure for cancer.
In any case: no, she's not a "fraud." She's just wrong. Very, very wrong. Wrong in a way that happens to be very attractive to VCs.
posted by koeselitz at 3:51 PM on November 10, 2015 [8 favorites]
>his is, IMO, what the actual collapse of SV will look like. People will repeatedly get funding for relatively high profile bullshit products/services that don't just fail, but were patently impossible to ever produce or operate in the first place.
so right now (because not even field experts can sort out which claims are bogus and which aren't), the rational play for VCs under the current metagame environment (or "meta" for short) is to distribute money to anyone who can put together something that plausibly looks like a business (anyone with a business plan and a Stanford guy, more or less). The rational play for startup founders under the current meta is to therefore put together as many quick and dirty shoddy business plans as possible.
The contradiction here will over time cause the meta to shift; as more and more Stanford guys come up with shitty business plans, it appears to become necessary for VCs to better vet the people and plans they fund. However, I would argue that this idea overlooks how the VCs have real reasons to prefer the crab strategy to the human strategy — even if you vet founders to weed out obvious scams, even real scientists can't reliably tell which of the remaining plans are plausible and which will turn out to be physically impossible.
As such, rather than turning to a more careful strategy, VCs have to find a way to keep the broad dissemination strategy profitable even in an environment wherein everyone is trying to exploit it. As such I suspect that the rational real response to the changing meta is to jump out of the system altogether — I believe the fancy German word for this sort of completion of a process that also annihilates the origin of that process is "aufhebung" — and instead leverage their connections to state power to establish sharp punishments for the founders of failed startups, while also pushing for things like extended extradition treaties to head off attempts at deploying the Havana strategy.
This would allow VCs to continue using the practically superior crab reproduction strategy while offloading the risk of failure onto the people taking their money.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 3:56 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
so right now (because not even field experts can sort out which claims are bogus and which aren't), the rational play for VCs under the current metagame environment (or "meta" for short) is to distribute money to anyone who can put together something that plausibly looks like a business (anyone with a business plan and a Stanford guy, more or less). The rational play for startup founders under the current meta is to therefore put together as many quick and dirty shoddy business plans as possible.
The contradiction here will over time cause the meta to shift; as more and more Stanford guys come up with shitty business plans, it appears to become necessary for VCs to better vet the people and plans they fund. However, I would argue that this idea overlooks how the VCs have real reasons to prefer the crab strategy to the human strategy — even if you vet founders to weed out obvious scams, even real scientists can't reliably tell which of the remaining plans are plausible and which will turn out to be physically impossible.
As such, rather than turning to a more careful strategy, VCs have to find a way to keep the broad dissemination strategy profitable even in an environment wherein everyone is trying to exploit it. As such I suspect that the rational real response to the changing meta is to jump out of the system altogether — I believe the fancy German word for this sort of completion of a process that also annihilates the origin of that process is "aufhebung" — and instead leverage their connections to state power to establish sharp punishments for the founders of failed startups, while also pushing for things like extended extradition treaties to head off attempts at deploying the Havana strategy.
This would allow VCs to continue using the practically superior crab reproduction strategy while offloading the risk of failure onto the people taking their money.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 3:56 PM on November 10, 2015 [2 favorites]
(this is where I admit that as I read Marx, "dialectical materialism" pretty much just means "metagame analysis," or "metagame analysis over time.")
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 3:57 PM on November 10, 2015
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 3:57 PM on November 10, 2015
I don't see why people are being kind. This is a scam. If by some miracle they manage to get ultrasonic charging to work in a somewhat practical way it will still be a bad idea. The system has to track users as they move and aim a high powered beam at where it thinks the target is at. If the problem you're trying to solve is avoiding having to plug in it would far easier to lower the energy demands of our phones by offloading energy sucking tasks on to nearby computers plugged into the wall.
posted by rdr at 7:14 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by rdr at 7:14 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
well I mean I figured we could just jump straight to "this is a scam, and scams are awesome."
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 8:22 PM on November 10, 2015
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 8:22 PM on November 10, 2015
Well, there is a fairly long history of startups getting funded to do one thing, failing at it, and completely changing course to do something better that ends up working. In that sense VCs are looking for a strong team, not any specific technology or idea. Of course it's not a great sign if your team throws away scientific evidence and all the engineers quit.
posted by miyabo at 8:45 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by miyabo at 8:45 PM on November 10, 2015 [1 favorite]
I've seen some painful demos. The linked demo video might have grabbed the #1 spot on my list.
posted by slagheap at 8:59 PM on November 10, 2015
posted by slagheap at 8:59 PM on November 10, 2015
4/Built novel high powered air-coupled ultrasonic txt, operates btwn 45-75 kHz, output btwn 145dB – 155dB (=316 W/m2 – 3kW/m2). Took 3 yrs
For reference 140 dB is the kind of volume you'd expect on an aircraft carrier deck. 150 dB ruptures your eardrums.
This isn't a pointless tech toy, it's a death ray.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 9:09 AM on November 11, 2015 [1 favorite]
For reference 140 dB is the kind of volume you'd expect on an aircraft carrier deck. 150 dB ruptures your eardrums.
This isn't a pointless tech toy, it's a death ray.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 9:09 AM on November 11, 2015 [1 favorite]
It sort of ruins my schadenfreude to know that while VCs have thrown $10M so far at this specific scientifically implausible idea alone, not to mention $400M at Theranos, qualified, practicing scientists with decades of experience running laboratories are facing increasingly slim odds (not to mention opposition in the Tea Party-controlled House) of convincing funding agencies to part with a mere $200-300K, to do research that actually goes through an extremely stringent selection for scientific importance and validity.
posted by en forme de poire at 11:49 AM on November 11, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by en forme de poire at 11:49 AM on November 11, 2015 [3 favorites]
Science is good science when it promises to alleviate some minor irritation that VCs consider themselves too rich to tolerate. (Bonus points for doing so remotely, wirelessly, smartly, autonomously, or nanomaterialistically.) With that in mind, scientists simply need to reframe their grant requests as sexy implausible startup proposals.
On an unrelated note, I'd like to tell you all about
ExSplynse! Based on cutting edge biology*, our next-gen tech promises to make painful splinters a thing of the past. No more tweezers, no more wincing, no more agony: simply apply our patented iPhone peripheral to the splinter site, and it will annihilate the offending chunk of wood with a refreshing micropulse from a rubidium maser.
*longitudinal studies of eider duck mating patterns on the Kola Peninsula
This sector promises unlimited growth potential - think G.E. plus Facebook plus Tesla minus Monsanto plus Snyders of Hanover. We're asking for four or five million this round to develop a production model and fund sixteen weeks of field work in Murmansk.
posted by Iridic at 1:16 PM on November 11, 2015 [4 favorites]
On an unrelated note, I'd like to tell you all about
*longitudinal studies of eider duck mating patterns on the Kola Peninsula
This sector promises unlimited growth potential - think G.E. plus Facebook plus Tesla minus Monsanto plus Snyders of Hanover. We're asking for four or five million this round to develop a production model and fund sixteen weeks of field work in Murmansk.
posted by Iridic at 1:16 PM on November 11, 2015 [4 favorites]
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posted by Sphinx at 5:54 PM on November 9, 2015 [11 favorites]